A law has been introduced in Germany's Bundestag, or lower house of
parliament, that would make it easier for researchers and companies to
obtain patents in the field of biotechnology and would finally bring Germany
into compliance with a European Directive issued in 1998.

The bill, which was given a first reading last week (March 11) in the
Bundestag, was introduced by Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder';s ruling coalition
of the Social Democrat and Green parties. It would grant commercial rights
for gene sequences but allow scientists free use of those patented sequences
for research purposes.

“It is an improvement on the present state of the law,” Joseph Straus,
managing director of the Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property,
Competition and Tax Law, told The Scientist, “and it would bring Germany
in line with EU guidelines.”

He said a declaration calling for a new patent law, made early last
year, would be valid for the current proposed law. The signers of that
declaration were the Max Planck Society, the German Research Foundation,
the German Association of Biotechnology Industries, the German Chemical
Industry Association, and the German Association of Research-based Pharmaceutical
Companies (VFA).

Straus said the EU directive mandated that member nations adopt new
patent laws by July 30, 2000. However, the only nations to have done so
are the United Kingdom, Ireland, Spain, Finland, Denmark, Portugal, and
Greece, he said. The European Union has taken legal action against eight
others.

This is not the first time Germany has attempted to comply with the
EU rules. In early 2002, Greenpeace, the German Medical Association, and
Misereor, an overseas development agency of the Catholic Church, teamed
up to help kill a proposed bill that appeared to be headed for passage.

Those opposed say that most biotech patents are based on “discoveries”
of matter that already exists and not on “inventions.”

A Social Democrat Party press spokesman told The Scientist that legislative
hearings will be conducted on the proposed bill for possible amendments
and that it will be “at least several weeks” before it is brought to the
floor of the Bundestag for a final vote.

Some members of the Green Party have already called for amendments to
a provision in the proposed bill that would give the patent holder of a
specific gene sequence the commercial rights on any future applications
tied to the sequence, even if those applications are not outlined in the
original patent.

Rolf Hoemke, spokesman for the pharmaceutical industry's VFA, told The
Scientist he believes the intent of the 1998 EU directive was to grant
commercial rights on any applications for a patented gene sequence.

Drug companies must invest heavily in research and the “patent rights
should go to those who have done the work,” he said.